Investing Like The Greats

Do you have an idol in the investing world? We have a couple of our own, so we decided to share a little background, advice and investing strategies from some of the world’s savviest financiers.

According to Quora, these are some of history’s greatest investors. Let’s see if your favorite made the list:

Warren Buffett (Chairman, Berkshire Hathaway)

One of the investors most cited as the greatest of all time is Warren Buffett.

With an estimated net worth of $67 billion, he’s inspired many traders and investors with his skill for money making - earning him hometown hero status with nicknames like “The Wizard of Omaha.”

Growing up, he pursued various money making ventures such as working as a paperboy, selling lost golf balls he found, his own small pin ball machine business, and of course playing the stock market from a young age.

He started his own investment company in his 20s, the Buffett Partnership, and now is the Chairman of and largest shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway.

Want some tips on how to invest like him? Buffett’s a fan of long-term value strategies and hybrid strategies of value and growth. He’s famous for saying, “If you are not willing to own a stock for 10 years, do not even think about owning it for 10 minutes.”

George Soros (Founder, Soros Fund Management)

Another investor often named one of the greatest is George Soros, founder and chair of Soros Fund Management.

A graduate of the London School of Economics, he’s notorious for “breaking the bank of England” through a short sale that earned him a $1 billion profit.

Soros is also famous for his philanthropy and notably funding activist groups in Ferguson, Missouri, with at least $33 million.

Like Buffett, Soros has lived very frugally despite his wealth.

Soros once explained his lifestyle as one more interested in ideas than money: “The main difference between me and other people who have amassed this kind of money is that I am primarily interested in ideas, and I don’t have much personal use for money. But I hate to think what would have happened if I hadn’t made money: My ideas would not have gotten much play.”

Jim Simons (Founder, Renaissance Technologies)

Worth $14 billion, Jim Simons founded successful hedge fund investment company Renaissance Technologies – earning him the nickname “Quant King.”

Renaissance Technologies is best known for its Medallion Fund, a fund with personal money from the firm’s executives, which never had a losing year.

The key to the fund’s success? Special computer algorithms that find inefficiencies in highly liquid securities.

Simons is also famous for working as a code breaker for the government during the Vietnam war.

He owes the success of his firm to their open-minded approach to trading ideas: “We have three criteria: If it's publicly traded, liquid and amenable to modeling, we trade it.”

Benjamin Graham (Author, The Intelligent Investor)

Known as one of the greatest influences to deep value investors like Warren Buffett and Whitney Tilson, Benjamin Graham is famously known as the “Father of Value Investing.”

He taught his value investing strategy at Columbia Business School and at UCLA Anderson School of Management.

His famous book, “The Intelligent Investor” recommends investing with a “group approach” – choosing to invest in a group of somehow related stocks that are undervalued.

Yet, he was also known for having a very diversified portfolio, what Warren Buffett called buying “a little of everything.”

Graham, as an investor in the 1940s and 50s, was widely critical of the unreliable financial reporting back in those days and urged businesses to be more transparent about finances.

He also was not a fan of saying a stock was a buy at any price – and would likely shake his head at Carl Icahn’s favoritism of Apple – saying, “A great company is not a great investment if you pay too much for the stock.”

Do you have other favorite investors? Let us know!